High-n tearing-parity modes in toroidal geometry
Abstract
We attempt to elucidate how effects associated with toroidal geometry generate parallel currents through mechanisms absent in slab or cylindrical geometry. In particular, we find that the presence of geodesic curvature introduces a novel mechanism for generating a parallel acceleration from perpendicular electric fields. This effect may be important to the effectiveness of nearly electrostatic tearing-parity modes in generating magnetic stochasticity; the (previously unexpected) instability of micro-tearing modes at low aspect ratio,; as well as the unexpectedly large current-channel width observed in recent simulations of microtearing modes.
This work was performed under the auspices of the U.S. Department of Energy by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory under Contract DE-AC52-07NA27344.- Publication:
-
APS Division of Plasma Physics Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- October 2011
- Bibcode:
- 2011APS..DPPGP9039N